Greenhouse Gas Emissions Trading Scheme (Amendment) (Extension to Maritime Activities) Order 2026

Lord Rogan Excerpts

Thursday 12th March 2026 Lords Chamber

[Earl Russell (LD)]

I welcome the noble and learned Baroness’s intervention. The Scotland issue relates to devolved legislation and legislation that Scotland has passed. The issue in relation to the CBAM is in relation to—

[Lord Rogan (UUP)]

Does that not also apply to Northern Ireland?

--- Later in debate ---

[Baroness Bennett of Manor Castle (GP)]

My Lords, I offer the Green Party’s support for this statutory instrument and oppose the regret and fatal amendments. I will add some extra points to this debate that have not yet been made. We must look at this in the context of global shipping, which, back in 2018, represented around 2.9% of global emissions caused by human activities and is projected to rise by up to 130% by 2050, which, essentially, would blow our climate restrictions out of the water, to use an appropriate metaphor.

In July 2023, the International Maritime Organization committed to new targets for greenhouse gas reductions and was going to adopt a basket of measures globally last year. Since then, as in many areas, we have seen President Trump put a spanner in the works. That makes it even more important for the UK to hold the line and set the standard in being, as we so often hear people saying, a world leader. If we take steps to get the fossil fuels out of these vessels and adopt alternatives then this will be world-leading. These are steps that will address the cost of living. I refer noble Lords to the report out this week from the Climate Change Committee. It noted that delivering net-zero targets will cost less than a single oil shock across the economy. Relying on fossil fuels is an extremely expensive, risky economic choice, as well as all the other issues.

There has been a fair bit about the Isle of Wight, but I want to build on what the noble Earl, Lord Russell, and the noble Lord, Lord Ashcombe, said. I had extensive comments, but they have said quite a bit of what I was going to say. The key point to add is that this is expected to add £1 to £2 extra to a ticket. We have grossly expensive transport options for the people on the Isle of Wight and a grossly unreliable transport system. We need huge improvements and huge changes. I speak as someone who goes to the Isle of Wight quite regularly.

Today, there are no wheelchairs, prams or bikes permitted on the FastCat due to a technical issue. The Fishbourne to Portsmouth car ferry sailings have been cancelled due to a combination of forecast wind conditions and the “St Clare” ferry running on three out of four engines due to a propeller issue. There are big problems with the Isle of Wight’s transport provision, but this is tiny in the scale of the broader problems that desperately need to be addressed.

It is worth noting what can be achieved and what is possible. On 10 March, the “Baltic Whale” took part in its first commercial voyage from Scandlines, which aims to operate without direct emissions by 2040. On the Rødby to Puttgarden route, the freight ferry makes the 10-mile crossing in 45 minutes. It has a charge time at each harbour of 12 minutes. Other countries are making huge advances. Interestingly, the “Baltic Whale” makes far less noise, which is of huge benefit to the natural environment, to the wildlife in the Baltic Sea and to human life.

I go back to the Air Quality Expert Group’s 2017 report, Impacts of Shipping on UK Air Quality, as not much has changed. It noted that shipping makes “significant contributions” to emissions of nitrogen oxide and sulphur dioxide, as well as PM2.5 and PM10—particulate matter. That includes emissions of black carbon and carbon dioxide. All those have major impacts on public health. If we get away from fossil fuels, we will make important steps to improve public health.

Finally, I have a direct question to put to the Minister, where I will stop supporting the Government and ask a challenging question. Everything I have just said—and what this SI does—is contradicted by the UK cruise growth plan, which aims to increase the amount of cruise ships. I draw here on a very useful briefing from Transport & Environment from the end of last year. Cruise ships are already having a huge impact on air quality in ports and can be responsible for up to 96% of toxic sulphur oxide pollution at the busiest terminals. That is particularly an issue at Southampton. It is also a very big issue in Belfast. How can the Minister justify taking steps here that are both public health measures and climate measures while the Government are in other ways promoting more pollution and more health damage?

[Lord Rogan (UUP)]

My Lords, in common with my noble friends and Ulster Unionist Party colleagues at the Stormont Assembly, I cannot support this legislation, which is detrimental to Northern Ireland, given the Province’s huge reliance on sea transport. We note that ferry services for the Scottish islands are exempt from this provision. Perhaps if Ministers were chasing votes in Northern Ireland in May, as they are for elections in Scotland, the exemption might have been extended across the Irish Sea as well. The Irish Sea is nothing less than an economic lifeline for the Province, with around 90% of its trade and passenger movements coming via ferries and shipping routes.

I have raised the issue of the lack of competitiveness in air services between Northern Ireland and Great Britain on numerous occasions in this House. Flying to and from Belfast on domestic routes has become incredibly expensive. Given the ongoing events in the Middle East, prices will likely rise still further. Unlike most other parts of the United Kingdom, the use of sea transportation is therefore not optional for many people and businesses in Northern Ireland.

I fully appreciate the Government’s aspiration to advance decarbonisation through the use of alternative fuels. However, if the world has learned nothing else over the past two weeks it is that there will be a continued reliance on fossil fuels for the foreseeable future in the UK and elsewhere, whether we like it or not. As such, the consequence of this order is the creation of what can only be described as a carbon tax in Northern Ireland, which would not have to be borne in anything like the same degree by the rest of the United Kingdom.

Of course, this comes as the Province continues to struggle with the seemingly ever-growing burden of costs on its people following the imposition of the Irish Sea border. The previous Conservative Government claimed to have removed it by dreaming up the Windsor Framework. It did not work. In opposition, the Labour Party pledged to improve matters if it came to power. It has not. Indeed, we have yet more costs being slapped on the Province through the order to keep Brussels happy, because the EU sets the rules in Northern Ireland now, not our supposedly sovereign UK Government.

If this order was for any purpose other than pleasing Brussels, the Government could and should have chosen to direct its proceeds into the Northern Ireland economy, perhaps with an emphasis on supporting our shipping industry and its transition to alternative means of propulsion, but they have not done so. Instead, we have yet another example of Whitehall taking the simplest option, with all the damaging implications it will have for that part of the United Kingdom, about which it knows little and, I feel, cares even less.

[Lord Redwood (Con)]

I agree with the contributions from Northern Ireland. This order is discriminatory against Northern Ireland in favour of Scotland, and it will do considerable damage to consumers and business in Northern Ireland.

I also welcome the remarks of my noble friend Lord Moynihan, who told us that we are engaged in a much wider debate on this rather narrow instrument now that the Government are saying that this is an important part of the United Kingdom’s participation in a carbon border adjustment mechanism—or carbon tariff—and, through the ETS at European level, in a carbon taxation scheme, which is even dearer than the United Kingdom one we have inflicted on ourselves. I urge the Government to think again. This has carried very badly in every part of the United Kingdom, represented here, that will be affected by it.

However, it is part of a much bigger error that government policy is creating. Over the last decade, the United Kingdom has been a world leader in reducing its CO₂ output and has been dutiful to a fault to treaty obligations that actually relate to more distant years. As a result, we have seen a catastrophic deindustrialisation, which has gathered huge pace and momentum in the last two years with the intensification of the net-zero policies this Government have welcomed and introduced. To extend part of this system to the maritime sector would cause further damage.

Many years ago, I had the privilege to lead a big international industrial group. In those days, the group had its headquarters and most of its main factories in England. We were proud of that. We struggled to compete, but we did compete. Where we had a problem, we remedied the problem. We needed to raise our capital efficiency, so we had to spend money and investment on better plant. We needed to train our staff and use our staff better so that it was a better organisation. We stayed in the market, and we stayed producing. For example, we were responsible for a large part of the ceramic tile industry in the Potteries, with its very distinguished tradition of innovation—and domination, at times—in that very important market.

While I was there, we managed to make the investments and stay competitive enough, although the Italians were very good. I watched with sadness and shame as my successors gave up the battle through no fault of their own. At our current energy prices, we are so far away from being able to do even something relatively simple in industrial terms, such as making good industrial tile for all the homes with bathrooms and kitchens that need it. That is replicated sector by sector now.

We have heard the Green case, feeble as it is, briefly sketched today in this short debate. My response to that is that practically every policy initiative this country has taken to reduce its own CO₂ has contributed to an increase in world CO₂. Why on earth is that good for the environment, let alone good for our economy? We will not get our own gas out of the ground, and so we import LNG, which generates three or four times as much CO₂ in the process than using our own. It is crazy, and we must stop doing this.

We need to have better-paid jobs and more investment in the United Kingdom. We need to rebuild our maritime industry. We heard from a very well-informed noble Lord, who told us that over his lifetime, supporting what was once a great industry, we have seen it almost disappear and vanish. This great maritime nation cannot now carry its own goods, because it did not create the right tax and regulatory conditions to sustain shipping in this country.

I urge the Government to think again. This is a small part of a big crisis. This is undermining our capacity to do well and make the things we need in this country. Dear energy is a killer. This is part of a package of measures that lumbers us with energy so dear we cannot make things for ourselves.